Palace orders immediate arrest of Masbate editor’s killer

Malacanang on Sunday urged the authorities to conduct intensified operations against the suspect behind the killing of a Masbate editor last Saturday.

”Authorities have been directed, especially the Philippine National Police, to launch intensified operations to arrest and bring those responsible for the killing of a media practitioner in Masbate to justice,” Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO) Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. said in an interview with Radyo ng Bayan.

Last Saturday, Ariel Verano Lerit, a publisher and editor of the local tabloid Masbate Times, was stabbed to death while inside a KTV bar with fellow media practitioner Bobby Bornillo.

The incident happened while the two mediamen were about to leave the KTV bar.

The victim sustained two stab wounds in the stomach that caused his instant death.

The killing of Lerit happened exactly two weeks after Bohol-based radio broadcaster Maurito Lim was killed by lone assailant while getting off his vehicles to host his “Chairman Mao on Board” on radio dyRD.

According to the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines, Lim was reportedly the 172 journalist killed since 1986.--by Jelly F. Musico (PNA)